A/N: Here it is folks! The sequel to Behind Closed Doors. I've been alternating writing this with Pandora's Box (Update coming shortly) No, it will not take me ages to update this one since I've already written out the majority of the story. I hope you take kindly to my new characters and keep a spot for Dash, because he's back like Shaft baby! Dependant upon reviews or notes to let me know how well this is received, I shall post chapters accordingly. Let's see what happens to King now...
McFadden-
Chapter One
King woke up suddenly on the last night that he would ever spend in the Honeycomb. A horrible mental flashback had just occurred.
The heart monitor was still screaming when Caulder and Dash, and even Zoe ran into the medical room to find King with her in his arms. That's when King heard Zoe's scream. It tore through him and he felt as though Abby had died all over again. Caulder just picked her up and carried her away. No amount of whispered condolences would ever make it alright for that little girl again. King just knew it. Dash stayed in the room and cleaned the blood spatter from King. If Dash didn't do it, he knew King wouldn't have...
Dash and Caulder both understood what happened as soon as King pulled himself together enough to speak. But, knowing no solace would comfort him anytime soon, both Caulder and Dash let him be until he was ready to come back to the land of the living, as they themselves grieved for Abby in their own ways. If anything did come as a result of this, it was only that the rift and bitterness between Caulder and King were forgotten
King was angrier that Caulder was there when he was not. Maybe then things would've turned out differently. Maybe Abby would still be alive.
Maybe he wouldn't feel like such a murderer...
King's eyes sifted in the darkness. He looked at the empty space beside him in the bed, Abby's side. He felt her part of the bed with his hand and imagined he could still see her outline there in the dark, creasing the sheets where she normally laid. Her scent was still embedded into the mattress. That caused more heartache than comfort. Almost everything about her was still fresh in his mind, all except the sound of her voice. It had been gone for 3 weeks and 5 days, and he wanted it back. But now, in the end, he had lost everything hadn't he...
Tomorrow was going to be a different day. King would leave this place with its bad memories behind for good. Caulder and Dash were taking him into their sleeper cell. As for Zoe, Dash had placed her safety in the care of someone who would be able to give her a normal life, and hopefully reverse the damage that had been done to her childhood by living this way, but he knew the truth. King was on his own from now on.
Walking around in a perpetual fuzziness that his sleepless night had put him under, King wasn't too alert or keen on having the sound of jarring rap music being pumped into his ears as he was picked up by Caulder. The Norwegian realized this and turned the volume down as he got into the car.
"Sorry, Dash was the last to use the car."
King looked at him with cheap loathing.
"...And it took you the whole way here to figure out where the volume button was?"
Caulder grinned at the scruffy, bed-headed man. He had missed King's jabs. Truthfully, King had all but lost his sense of humor and was more or less a mute in the weeks following Abigail's death. It was nice to hear some of it return. Caulder thought that King would've wanted to bring more things with him, but he was surprised to see only his tactical and weaponry sack and two duffels full of clothes. Nonetheless, he pitched them into the back of the Explorer and started their wordless drive to King's new residence.
As they approached the drive, King noticed that the compound was secluded by massive trees, but what was perhaps more intriguing was that, once they pulled up to the main house, King could see the entire city below in a drop-off from behind the compound.
Entering into the strange place for the first time, King didn't really know exactly what to expect judging from its looks outside. It was massive, with its huge sets of steel doors and cinder block casings. Caulder pointed to a large commons area where it seemed that everyone hung out there in their spare time. Remnants of signs of life were scattered upon the floor and chairs. A large scripture's journal with sketches, a stack of books by a lounge chair, a laptop King fairly recognized as belonging to Dash. And lastly, a somewhat semi-fresh residual spot on the floor caused by some spilled liquid. Caulder's deep, cultured voice spoke out loud.
"This is home...although, it seems like we're the only ones here for the moment. I thought Dash was going to meet me as soon as he dropped the kids off but I guess he got caught up."
At the mention of the word kids, King shot him a moderately horrified look. The thought that anymore children were exposed to this life would make him sick to his stomach right now. The Norwegian seemed to catch onto the source of King's anxiousness and cracked a comfortable smile.
"I was being figurative King, there not actually children. Although the jury's still out on the oldest of the three. I guess just make yourself at home until they get back."
King shrugged and eyed his prospects to relax. He chose the recliner next to the stack of novels. Picking one up, he read the title. Anything called 'Invisible Monsters' didn't seem too enticing to crack open, even if it did have an attractive silhouette of a woman on it. He just entertained himself with scanning the room more as Caulder excused himself to go get cleaned up.
Not even a half hour passed before King's nerves were startled as he heard faint shouting that grew closer with every syllable. To his surprise, the voice seemed to be that of a woman.
"Every time...every-fucking-time!"
A small, meek-looking boy, King wouldn't call anyone with a stature of a toothpick a man, paced into the room anxiously looking over his shoulder. The shouts and what sounded like apologies?... were becoming clearer until a man, taller than King and built like a brick wall, stumbled back into the entrance looking equally as anxious as the boy before him.
"If I hadn't have done that then we'd still be there wasting time."
His hands were out stretched trying to catch the noticeably smaller, gloved hand that clawed out at his forearm. He hissed through his teeth and recoiled, shooting daggers at the assailant with his eyes. King was marginally amused until the owner of the hand became more than just a hand and a voice.
The hand became a toned, well-defined forearm, attached to sculpted shoulders, peeking through sable colored hair, that hid something of a face belonging to a 6'1 frame.
"You son of a bitch! You never think before you act! I swear to fucking God that if you set off a silver shrapnel bomb that close to me or anyone again, I promise you that a bomb will be the next and last thing your dick gets blown by."
King's eyebrows rose substantially. For a second, just one split second, he thought of Danica. He watched as the man grimaced. The woman's face had finally been cleared from her halo of dark hair and she looked livid. A piece of King's old attitude echoed in his head. Hot...but livid.
"Hey, my blood is your blood. Remember that..."
She sighed and glared at him, although her gaze seemed to have lost some of it's venom.
"Oh don't give me that nepotism shit Lindsay, just..."
She sighed at him, the longer she stood there the more apparent it was that almost all of her anger had melted away, but it was replaced with disappointment.
"...Just don't do that again."
Dash startled King by elbowing him, so far his presence had been unnoticed.
"It's like a movie..."
King leaned in and whispered.
"...But there's no way in hell that I'd let Toots over there yell at me that way."
Just as soon as the whisper left his mouth, he wished he could've sucked it back in because he knew that she had heard him. King froze as she set her pair of enraged eyes on him. Dash recoiled with a wince.
"Apparently, you don't know Toots very well..."
King watched as every muscle visibly tightened in the woman's body and he suddenly felt very sorry that she apparently had superior hearing.
"Who the fuck are you!"
His mouth opened and closed like a dry-docked fish but nothing came out. Bela just glared at him. Her gaze both accusatory and very uncomfortable for him as she sized King up. Without warning she was instantly at level with his face and he flinched, feeling her too close to him. Lindsay looked over at King and recognition hit him. He walked over to the woman, grabbing her shoulders lightly, and chided her.
"Be nice Bela, that's Hannibal King. It would be unbecoming of you to leave him with such a sour first impression."
She scoffed and harshly shrugged herself out of his grasp.
"Speak for yourself...I asked him a question."
Lindsay gave her a stern look along with an equally clipped tone.
"You're making yourself look like a bitch, Bela..."
Her sculpted brow lifted in frigid amusement as she casually strolled across the room, shooting daggers in King's direction and then replying to Lindsay scathingly.
"Yeah, well at least I don't look like Ned Flanders with a beard."
There was a brief silence in the room before Dash began to choke from trying not to laugh outright. Lindsay on the other hand, gave King an apologetic look, clenched his jaw, and stiffly walked out of the room after Bela. Dash chimed in at the perfect moment.
"And...that's the kids..."
King turned to him like he had just been sent to an asylum.
"What the hell was that?"
Caulder laughed and walked towards them.
"Just a little sibling rivalry..."
Dash nodded.
"By all intensive purposes Bela was right though, Lindsay's irrational behavior could've killed them. Hell, I'm almost sure Mikey would've lost an arm had Bela not grabbed him."
King couldn't help but interject.
"Is that the skinny boy?"
Caulder mouth ticked upward in its corners and he nodded. King looked around the room curious as to where said boy had disappeared to. Caulder glanced to him and clapped his hands once.
"Well, I'm beat! I'm sorry there wasn't much of a warm welcome tonight. They do behave more often than not if you can believe it. As for the compound, we'll give you a better tour once the sun's up, for now we have to figure out a more suitable sleeping arrangement than the den."
Dash broke in.
"Actually he can have Mikey's room."
Caulder's eyes furrowed and King looked equally hesitant.
"I'm not bunking with a dude...
Disregarding his comment, Caulder spoke over him.
"Why would Mikey not want to sleep his room?"
This was news to Caulder. Dash's lips tipped up ever so slightly.
"Well he hasn't exactly been sleeping there for about 2 months."
Realizing the nomadic sleeping habits of his group, Caulder sighed.
"Yeah but we only have so many couches he can sleep on, he'll get tired of it eventually and then where's he going to sleep?"
Dash shrugged, he smile getting a tad bigger but noone seemed to notice except for King, who was nervously awaiting the reasoning behind his grin.
"Put Mikey in Bela's room, hers is big enough for another bed. He's been in there more than in his own room, besides, he almost got injured tonight. Trust me, he's not going to mind."
Noting the double meaning in his words King began to wonder just how close the two were. Please don't let them be shacking it up. But that was the last thing he wanted to envision. If he thought that someone that scrawny to get with someone that pretty he might start to resent the little fucker before he knew anything about him. He could only imagine him using Bela for his own personal jungle gym. Before King could worry himself too much further, said scrawny boy appeared from the hall and just winked at the whole group as he walked past. The outburst from King that followed just couldn't be stopped.
"You've gotta be shittin' me..."
King was thoroughly grossed out for the evening and as Caulder led him to Mikey's room he was grateful that it didn't seem to be close to any other bedroom. So there was hope that he wouldn't overhear something he could truly have done without.
Nighttime, or better put; sleeping, was the worst part of day for King because no matter how much he tried to pull himself out of his past and focus on reality, his dreams always haunted him. She always haunted him...
He laid down in the unfamiliar bed that was only a twin size and uncomfortably shifted from side to side. His eyes glared up at the darkened ceiling and he sighed heavily. His as-close-to-perfect-as-he-could-get-it life was ruined. Many times he had wondered exactly what would've happened if he hadn't pulled the trigger.
You know exactly what would've happened you fucking idiot. She would've turned! She would've resented you for letting her turn. The resent would turn to hate, and as soon as the bloodlust hit her, she would've killed you instead.
King pleaded with his mind to shut up and rest but there were so many thoughts and unanswered questions floating around. He could just hope that exhaustion would be kinder tonight and take him early and not leave him to suffer. But at long last, it was in vain. A tear slid down his cheek as he turned over on his side, and it would definitely not be his last for tonight. A fleeting thought passed through his mind as King closed his eyes. He wondered if Abby would've liked these people...
